


Cover Me Up

by Borgupine



Category: Farscape, Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars (2004)
Genre: Cabin Fic, F/M, Love, Romance, Sex, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-08
Updated: 2021-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:13:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28627833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Borgupine/pseuds/Borgupine
Summary: Enjoying their first time away together since become parents, John and Aeryn visit a cabin in the woods. But old traumas and fears rise to the surface.
Relationships: John Crichton/Aeryn Sun
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Cover Me Up

It didn’t look a thing like Earth. The trees grew down instead of up, their roots stretching out to a pink sky. If he squinted, it could have been sunset over a stretch of Tennessee woods. And there was the cabin, right where the ad said it would be.

“Remind me again why we’re here,” Aeryn said. “The position’s hardly defensible, there’s nothing around for miles, and the only food I can see is what we’ve brought.”

“It’s a cabin in the woods,” John replied, “that’s the point.”

She turned her head around so fast that her heavy plait swung over her shoulder. “This is your big surprise?”

He shrugged. “My brain’s cleaner than it’s been for years, the Scarrans and Peacekeepers are dealt with. We deserve a break.”

“So, this it then? We’re staying here?”

“Yup.”

“There’s not some special distortion inside, or a transport hub?”

“Nope.”

“Just me and you in a cabin in the middle of nowhere for three days?”

“Come on,” John said, slapping her on the butt, “you’ll love it.”

*

An hour later, John had chopped enough wood he hoped would see them through until morning. It took more than that to get a fire going. In the end, he resorted to stacking the wood and letting off a low-powered blast with Winona. Worked like a charm.

Aside from some funky looking keepsakes on the walls, the cabin was the same as any on earth. Wood roof and walls, a single room with a stone hearth for cooking and keeping warm, and a bed in one corner.

“I’ll fix you some beans,” John said, turning out his rucksack.

“Beans?”

“Can’t come out to the woods without eating beans. It’s the rules, like peeing outside and skinny dipping in the river.”

Aeryn sat on the bed, setting her hands on the edge like she was getting ready to run.

“Will you relax,” John added. “I told you, Chi’s fine with Deke. The little guy loves her.”

“I know. Believe me, I’m grateful for the break, but…” She sighed. “How does anyone do this? I can’t just switch off.”

“Don’t think I didn’t notice the pulse pistol on your thigh.”

She looked down, cocking her head. “See? I don’t remember putting it on. I never left anywhere without a weapon.”

“You’re not PK anymore.”

“No, now I’m a mother and that’s made me even more alert. Anyway, you brought yours with you.”

“’Cept I kept mine in the bag.”

With a grin, John tossed Winona aside and came towards Aeryn, crouching low and clicking his fingers like he was putting on a one-man version of _West Side Story_. Her composure held for a few seconds, before she sputtered.

“That’s… wow, that’s really something, John. Another mating ritual?”

“Like I need a mating ritual,” he said, skidding onto his knees. He shuffled forward, clicking the whole time.

When he reached Aeryn, he placed his hands on her knees and worked them up. She made a tiny breath, enough to part her lips. As soon as his hand grazed her pulse pistol, he clipped it off and tossed it.

“Hey—”

“Winona will look after her.”

John straightened his back, closing the distance between their lips.

“My pistol’s a ‘her’ now is it?” Aeryn said, close enough to smell her breath, like a breeze right after rainfall.

“All guns are hers. I don’t make the rules, honey. I just follow them.”

Barely an inch apart, they shared the same air.

“I’ve got a rifle that says otherwise.”

Their lips just touched so that when John spoke, Aeryn’s echoed with it. “You like me because I’m a scoundrel.”

Aeryn pulled her head back. “What?”

“Nothing,” John said and shook his head. “Just frelling around.”

“This isn’t more Scorpius in your head stuff?”

“Harvey, no he’s long gone. I’m all yours.”

“Say that again.”

John stood to attention, fixing his hand to his head in salute. “I’m. All. Yours.”

Aeryn grabbed a fistful of his shirt and pulled him onto the bed. She kissed him long and deep, urgent as a sun about to swallow a planet. She raked her fingers through his hair, down his back, and he tugged at her plait, arching her head to taste her tongue.

She pushed him, stuck one boot heel against his chest, and raised her eyebrow. Returning the gesture with a smile, John unbuckled the boot, kissing the straps the whole while, until he slipped it off. The same for the other, then her pants. She shuffled down the bed, making her top rise passed her midriff. Stretch marks sat either side of her stomach like lightning strikes, making her more beautiful. 

John unbuckled his belt, pulled it off with theatrical flourish and tossed it to the same corner their pulse pistols lay.

*

“What’s a scoundrel, anyway?” Aeryn asked.

With the fire burning hot, the blanket was abandoned somewhere near the end of the bed. The orange light glowed off her bare skin. The curve of her body was fitted to John’s so that she barely had to whisper for him to hear. Her left hand teased the hair on his chest and belly, and one leg laid across his thighs.

“What?”

“A scoundrel, that’s why you said I liked you.”

“It’s…” John laughed. “A dashing rogue that princesses can’t help falling in love with. You know, Han Solo, Robin Hood, and—”

“John Crichton?” 

“Depends who’s telling the story.”

“I seem to recall you couldn’t help falling in love with me. If anything, I’m the scoundrel.”

“You’re calling me a princess?”

“I think I’ve had my fill of princesses,” she said.

“Yeah,” John replied.

Neither one of them mentioned Jool, but she could have been there screaming in a corner, cracking the fireplace. It was supposed to be the two of them, a cabin, three days, and nothing to worry about. No one hunting them, nothing expected for them to do.

“I gotta pee,” he said, after a while.

“Again?” Aeryn said, taking her leg away.

“I always have to pee after sex, you know that.”

Aeryn smirked. “Then stop having sex.”

“I will if you do.”

Instead of getting dressed again, he just wrapped himself in the blanket and pulled on his boots. Outside, the cold hit him like a wave.

Even before the pee started flowing, he was chattering. And little Crichton was shrivelling up to Hynerian proportions. The pink sky had turned a dark blue, almost purple. The star clusters looked like knots of silver string and the moons, all eight of them, shone like disco lights.

After he was finished, John stood a moment staring out at the trees, where the light from the cabin windows ended. Harvey could have strolled out of the trees and it wouldn’t have surprised him in the least. Nothing came though. Only memories. He pushed the image of Scorpy’s ugly vampire face away and thought of his kid instead. Which made him think of D’Argo and then everyone else he’d lost.

He left their memories out in the dark and came back into the warmth where Aeryn was waiting. She was sprawled on the bed, hands above her head, naked as you please as if she’d actually seen _Titanic_. If John could draw worth a damn, he’d have sketched her then and there.

His gaze flicked over to the little cabinet by the bed, where her pulse pistol now sat. They exchanged a look, but John let it lie.

“It must really be cold out there,” Aeryn said, inclining her head.

The blanket had come free so that John stood like he was wearing an old brown cloak – more Ben Kenobi than Han Solo.

When he didn’t response, Aeryn added, “Are you going to shut the door?”

“Right.”

He pushed the door up, secured the clasp and, after a moment’s hesitation, locked it. When he came to the bed, Aeryn put her arms around him and pressed herself close, skin so warm it felt scalding.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Nothing, really,” he replied. “Doesn’t matter where we are, so long as you’re there with me, it’s home. But if I so much as step outside…”

“Everything looks darker?”

“And Bingo was his name-o.”

“Then we’ll have to stick together. Now you’ll never be rid of me.”

“If there’s anyone I want on my scent, it’s you.”

“It’s a good scent.”

She buried her face to the crook of his neck and inhaled deep, before running her tongue all the way up to his ear. It sent a shiver up his spine that had nothing to do with the cold.

“Turn over,” she said and sucked her finger, making him shiver again all over.

“One minute.”

Quick as he could, John leapt out of bed and fed the fire. He was only dimly aware that they only had three bits of wood left. But that could wait.

He laid down on his front and let Aeryn trace a wet finger down his spine, passed the small of his back, and lower until he groaned.

*

John jolted awake, reaching out for… _something_. Finding nothing, he was left with heavy breaths and a racing heart.

A dream, just a dream, he told himself. Deke wasn’t strapped into the Aurora chair, crying and screaming. Their son was safe. 

When his eyes adjusted, he found Aeryn sat on the edge of the bed, fully dressed, buckling up her boots. Just an outline in the gloom, the fire having burned down to almost nothing.

“What are you doing?” He wiped a film of sweat off his brow, even though it was cold enough in the cabin to tighten up his skin.

“I heard something,” she replied, and slapped the last buckle into place. “I’m going to investigate.”

She stood up without a sound and grabbed her pulse pistol from the bedside table.

“There’s nothing out there,” John said, trying to force the shakiness out of his voice. “Why’d you think it took me so long to find this place. We’re the only sentient life planetside.”

Aeryn went to the door, her boots knocking against the floor.

“Just put the gun down, Aeryn, please. Leave your boots by the bed and get back in with me.”

“What’s the harm in checking? It’s better to be safe than sorry.” Her voice was soft, like she was trying to convince herself. Maybe it was the same way John was speaking.

“If you go out there, it won’t ever end. We’ll always be looking over our shoulders for shadows, thinking we’ve got to run. That’s no way to raise a kid.”

“Yes, and how do you know that?”

“Because I’ve been looking over my shoulder since that wormhole first spat me out,” he said. “Except for when I’m with you.”

“I have to check. I have to know.” Her voice wobbled.

“Then we’ll both go.”

“You just said—”

“If you’re gonna go, better we stick together.”

“You’re not even dressed.”

“I’ve got the blanket, it’s fine.”

“It’s freezing.”

“You can warm me up again.”

As soon as he slipped his own boots on and wrapped the blanket around tight, John joined her at the door.

“Aeryn?” he said, when her hand lingered on the key.

“I just realised what I heard.”

John placed a hand on her shoulder. “What?”

“Nothing,” she said. “It’s so quiet here. I didn’t realise until now. I didn’t hear anything and that’s what made me want to run.”

“Next time I’ll find us a nice noisy beach.”

She let out a tired laugh on an exhale. “Next time,” she said.

“I just always had this fantasy of spending a weekend with my best girl in a cabin in the woods, nothing to do except to fish and hike and—”

“And frell.”

“And that,” John said. “Let’s go back to bed.”

Aeryn sniffed. “There’s no wood left.”

“And it’s cold as a well digger’s ass in here, I know. But I’m not going out to chop wood, I’m staying here with you.”

Aeryn leant against John’s hand, still pressed against her shoulder. “Alright,” she said, and let her gun drop to the floor. She unbuckled her boots, left them by the bed, and undressed before getting in.

“This best girl in your fantasies, who was she?” Aeryn asked as John laid down beside her with the blanket.

“Michelle Pfeiffer, Kim Basinger, Princess Leia, Jessica Rabbit,” he replied, counting on his fingers. “Once upon a time maybe. I think it was always supposed to be you.”

Aeryn moved in close. 

“Everything that happened led me here, right now with you. I’ve seen so much stuff, things my species won’t see for centuries, maybe ever. You’d think I wouldn’t believe in destiny, but it’s like leaving earth, everything with Scorpy, all of it, I made it through because someone knew I was supposed to be here, right now, with you.”

“Well, that makes two of us,” Aeryn said and brought the blanket over their heads, covering them up and shutting everything else out.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired and loosely based on the song 'Cover Me Up' by Jason Isbell.


End file.
